Los contenidos informativos sobre la COVID-19 durante la segunda y tercera ola en RTVE y RTP

Abstract

The use of informative content transmitted by the media during the pandemic can act as a differential tool to reduce contagion. The information reported by the media during the course of the pandemic generates a global image that influences prevention. The study focuses on finding out what changes are observed in the news content and the peaks of incidence of the pandemic and whether there is any relationship between the news offer and the contagion curve. A sample of 36 news programmes from the Portuguese (RTP) and Spanish (RTVE) public television channels selected in 6 purposive samples is analysed, which coincide with the periods prior to the changes in the trend of the second and stubborn wave of contagion curve, from June to December 2020. The results show a reiterative thematic concentration in accounts of the measures in force and in the incidence figures in the area of dissemination and their international evolution in a descriptive way, but without a proactive involvement of the media in health dissemination. It has been detected that the increase in content on the application of governmental measures for control intensifies in periods prior to the fall in the contagion curve.